By Sergio Ferrara and Rudolf M Mössbauer, World Scientific Series in 20th Century Physics, Volume 39. Hardback ISBN 9789812700186 £69 ($128).
The “superworld” is a subject of formidable interest for the immediate future of subnuclear physics to which Antonino Zichichi has contributed with a series of important papers of phenomenological and theoretical nature. These papers represent a must-have collection, not only for their originality, but also for their complete analysis of expected scenarios on the basis of today’s knowledge of physics. The contributions are divided into two parts. The first deals with the problem of the convergence of the three fundamental forces of nature measured by the gauge couplings, with the onset of the energy threshold for the production of the lightest supersymmetric particles and with the existence of a gap between the string scale and the GUT scale. The second deals with the study of a theoretical model capable of including supersymmetry with the minimum number of parameters (possibly one), and agreeing with all the conditions established by string theories – this turns out to be a “one-parameter no-scale supergravity” model whose experimental consequences are investigated for present and future facilities aimed at the discovery of the first example of the superparticle.
